APTampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Mike Williams, right, braces for a hit during training camp in August with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Tampa, Fla. -- He knows better than anybody that this isn’t Syracuse or Buffalo or any place else up north along that 2½-hour stretch of the Thruway. And it’s not just because Thursday’s afternoon came with 80-degree weather, a cloudless sky above and warm zephyrs blowing through his braids.

The glass football, four stories tall and standing guard over the entry to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ compound, was another giveaway. As were the life-sized statues in the lobby of Super Bowl heroes Jon Gruden and Warren Sapp and Mike Alstott and Ronde Barber and Simeon Rice and Brad Johnson and Shelton Quarles and John Lynch and Derrick Brooks.

Oh, and the 2003 Vince Lombardi Trophy, under both glass and shining light over there near the door, was pretty much telltale, too.

Clearly, Mike Williams was aware that he was planted in neither Central nor Western New York as he sat down after the Bucs’ practice with a smile that could have lit up a storm cellar.

"I feel great," he said. "I thank God every day that I’m here. I’m doing what I do best, and that’s play football. It’s very amazing to me. I’m living my dream."

The truth of the matter is that Williams, the first rookie to start at wide receiver for the Tampa Bay franchise in 20 years and a guy who’s already scored two touchdowns in his NFL career that is only three games long, is also sticking it to some people. And he couldn’t be happier to do so.

More to the point, he could not have been more eager on Thursday to attempt to set a certain murky record straight.

"I’m going to tell you this, and then I’m going to let it go," Williams declared. "I didn’t quit the team last year. I did not quit. I’m not a quitter. I’ve never quit anything in my life. People who know me don’t know me as a quitter. I don’t know why that came up. I just don’t. But I did not quit that team."

He was speaking, of course, of the 2009 Syracuse University Orange, which played its last five affairs (four of which were lost by a cumulative 74 points) after Mike had either vanished or been banished, depending upon whose prattle you embrace.

First, though, the Mike Williams primer:

A star at Buffalo’s Riverside High School, Williams moseyed east to SU and led the Orange in receiving yards with 461 as a freshman (2006) . . . caught 60 passes for 837 yards and 10 touchdowns as a sophomore (2007) . . . missed what would have been his junior campaign as an academic casualty (2008) . . . and then dominated the Syracuse offense with 49 receptions good for 746 yards and six touchdowns in seven games before leaving both school and the Orange program in a carriage made of rumor and innuendo (2009).

Doug Marrone, the SU coach who can be a mysterian when he so chooses, has never publicly stated that Williams -- No. 2 on SU’s receiving list with 20 TDs, No. 4 with 133 receptions and No. 5 with 2,044 yards -- abandoned his post. But then has said nothing to stymie such discourse, either. So tongues have wagged and keyboards have been tapped, all while conclusions have been drawn.

And Williams, older than your normal 23-year-old Buccaneer, remains unamused though not particularly angry. Rather, he’s perplexed as he otherwise delights in his new southern life. That’s it. Perplexed.

"People say don’t read the papers," said Williams, whose Orange follies (of unknown weight and volume) inspired his fall into the fourth round of last spring's NFL Draft before he was finally rescued by Tampa Bay. "But I read the papers. I want to know what everybody is talking about. So I read the papers and I see stuff like, ‘He doesn’t have a chance.’ ‘Character is an issue.’ ‘This guy won’t be drafted.’ ‘He won’t work hard.’ You know, all the negative stuff.

"Well, now I’m proving everybody wrong and people are jumping back on my side. ‘He’s a good receiver now.’ It’s funny. But everyone who knows me, who knows what kind of a player I am, they knew what I could do. They always knew. They're not surprised and neither am I. I always knew I could compete with these guys up here."

Fact is, if Williams had played those final five contests last fall and had enjoyed his usual production in them and then departed for the NFL, he’d have left SU as its greatest-ever receiver. Statistically, anyway, with more receptions, more receiving touchdowns and pretty close to more receiving yards than any of those Monks and Harrisons and Moores.

And yet, there seemed on Thursday to be no serious hard feelings.

"I’m Orange for life," Williams vowed. "No matter what my situation was, I still say I’ll always bleed Orange. It’s just that now I bleed Orange and Buccaneer Red. But, listen, I’m Syracuse forever. That’s my team. I love that team. I’d suit up for them today if I could."

And Doug Marrone, who can be as pliable as the fender on a bus? Is he the villain in this piece? The clammy hand? The nail in the tire?

"No, it’s not like that," Mike said. "We used to joke together. If I saw him on the street, I’d give him a big hug. I’d call him, ‘Coach.’ He’s trying to turn that program around and I respect him for that. It just didn’t work out between us. Really, I have no hard feelings. I'm telling you, I love Syracuse. Always will."

That doesn’t mean, though, that he’d rather be up there with us than down here with the Bucs. There’s something to be said about working the job of your dreams among gentle breezes. The absolution that has come with it hasn’t been bad, either.

(Bud Poliquin’s columns, his "To The Point" observations and his freshly-written on-line commentaries appear virtually every day on syracuse.com. His work can also be regularly found on the pages of The Post-Standard newspaper. Additionally, he can be heard Mondays through Fridays (10 a.m.-12 noon), on the "Bud & the Manchild" sports-talk radio show on The Score 1260-AM. E-mail: bpoliquin@syracuse.com.)